SINCERE AND CONTINUOUS HUMAN EFFORT ESSENTIAL''

Shri Ajay asked: How to co-ordinate the concept of God in the day to day practical life?

Swami Replied: The day to day practical life involves the fulfilment of desires through our sincere and continuous efforts, which give us the fruits of the corresponding desires. This is the essence of the life of any ordinary human being called as Pravrutti. If you take the case of an atheist, he proceeds along with the Pravrutti only without mixing it with God or Nivrutti. For him, there is no God and he does not fear for the non-existent (as per his view) punishments in this life and severe punishments after death in the hell. He also argues that sin should not be done to maintain the equity and balance of the society. This reason given by him is hypocricy only since he performs sin secretly if an opportunity is obtained.

He thinks that the sin of one person does not disturb the balance of the society and this is the case of several theists also! But, if every person thinks like this, the result is total chaos in the society, which is not liked by God since His aim is always the balance in the society.

The constant effort of God is only to establish the justice in Pravrutti and not Nivrutti, which is His personal affair. Nivrutti is always initiated by the devotee and not God. A king ordered that every citizen should contribute a cup of milk to be poured in a big vessel kept in the centre of the city. Everybody thought that he can pour a cup of water, which cannot be detected in the huge milk contributed by all others. The result was that the big vessel was filled with water only and no drop of milk was seen in it. This is the case of almost every atheist even though there may be very few good atheists thinking about the resulting chaos. It is important to note that many theists also follow this same concept and do sins secretly. Such bad theists are punished and the good atheists are granted heaven here as well as there.

The fundamental slip is to think that the fruits are achieved by sincere and continuous efforts only done with full self confidence. This is fundamentally wrong and hence we fail to achieve the fruits by sincere efforts and self-confidence in our lives on several occasions. These failures bring tensions and spoil the health. This fundamental concept should be rectified by the correct fundamental concept. The fruit is given by God and not by the effort or the self-confidence you maintain in such effort. This does not mean that God will give you the fruit without effort. Your effort must be sincere and continuous as in the case of others. But, you should know that the generator of the fruit is neither your effort nor your self-confidence. You must do the effort with all sincerity in continuous way. You must replace the self-confidence by the confidence in God and know that the fruit is always given by God. Now, the failure of your effort does not bring any tension in you because the effort is not the generator of the fruit. Such right knowledge removes your wrong impression that the generator of the fruit is your sincere and continuous effort. If you maintain this concept continuously, never tension comes due to the failure of your effort. You will think that God did not give the fruit since some better fruit is going to be given by Him in course of time.

Attraction for Fruit Makes Even Devotee to Think That He alone can Do Sin

The background of this whole story is your attachment and attraction for the fruit. This attraction for the fruit itself is the cause for your failure. This attachment gives anxiety, which consumes your energy and there is no energy leftover to do the work with concentration. This can be understood from thermodynamics in which it is stated that

Q = rise in the internal energy + work done.

Q is the energy achieved and associated with you. The anxiety will raise your internal energy and all the energy associated with you is spent in such rise of internal energy. Now there is no energy leftover for the work. If the anxiety is absent, there is no raise in the internal energy. All the energy present in you is fully diverted to the work. This generates the success provided you have the confidence in God and know that the giver of the fruit is God only. The self-confidence is essentially self-ego only. God does not give fruit often so that this ego in yourself is crashed and you will develop the confidence in God, which is the basis of devotion. God is Father and teacher also for every human being. This is a continuous training given to you by God. This concept exists in the statement that “Man Proposes and God Disposes”.

The proposal of man, which is normally associated with self-confidence, brings the failure. The same proposal with sincere and continuous efforts associated with the confidence in God leads to success. Even in this case, if the fruit is not achieved, you should not be worried because God will certainly give a better fruit in future. The present fruit is harmful to you about which you do not know. Hence, the desire generating the attachment for fruit should be destroyed (Maa Phaleshu..., Samkalpa Prabhavaan... Gita). Buddha also preached that the desire, which is the seed for the attraction for the fruit should be avoided. This attraction for the fruit makes even a devotee to think that he alone can do the sin (not knowing that everybody thinks like this only) secretly to achieve the fruit. Naturally, the effort fails and the fruit is not given by God since, your sin is not desirable to God. This sin is not only disturbing the balance of society but also disturbs your health by tension due to non-achievement of fruit.

Yoga does not mean avoiding the tension by doing physical exercises and exercises in breathing. Of course, these exercises bring some good health in the body so that your health can resist the damage caused by tension to some extent. This is a solution from the backside of the problem. The solution from the front side of the problem is to avoid the tension itself by using this right knowledge. The first is a defensive method and the second is offensive method. The second is always better than the first.

The practical problem here is also that you don't remember this concept immediately on the attack of the tension. The failure of the effort brings anger and tension, which leads to loss of memory and finally the self-destruction becomes the final fruit (Dhyayato Vishayaan... Gita). Of course, after some time after the attack of tension, you will remember this concept provided you know it and think about it. The propagation of any concept to others helps not only others but also yourself because the concept becomes strong in your mind by the process of preaching.

Hence, sacrificial work for the sake of others gives you also the benefit in both ways. If you confine the concept (knowledge) in your mind only, it never becomes strong because you will not memorize it since you get bored. The interest comes in preaching the concept to others, which leads to strengthening the concept. Shankara told that the discussion of divine knowledge (Satsanga) gives you the detachment from fruits (Nissanga) and the final fruit is the liberation from all worries (Jeevan Mukti). If your discussion is related to God also, that will increase your devotion and confidence in God by which you achieve the fruits also. Hence, detachment from the desires and fruits and attachment to God will bring you the happiest life in which you are relieved from all the worries and also blessed with all the good fruits.

This is a double benefit scheme in which loss is avoided and benefit is gained. This is the essence of the Gita preached by the Lord. For a common man, achievement of fruit is essential to get happiness, which can be achieved only by the devotion to God. Detachment from the tensions relieves you from all the worries, which is the liberation from tension and this is also required for the common man. This will gradually lead to higher state in which you will be attached to God and get happiness from God only, which is associated with liberation from the worries of the world. For some time, God gives the fruits like initial chocolates to a child so that you will enter into the higher state. But, most of the people always remain in the first state only!!